Thank goodness. Not long ago, the Bank of England thought that inflation might rise to 3.2pc. (I suspected that when the Bank threw in the towel on its long-held, comparatively sanguine view about inflation prospects, this must be the time to turn optimistic about inflation.)

The UK’s case is not typical of the world in general. Admittedly, much of the upward pressure has originated from higher commodity prices, and that pressure has been endured internationally. But many of the wounds have been self-inflicted – through tax rises put in place to reduce the budget deficit, and rises in administered prices such as student tuition fees. On top of that, there has been continuing upward pressure emanating from the fall of sterling four to five years ago.

Now the pressures from commodity prices have subsided. Over the past two years, global oil prices have been stable, contrasted with a doubling between 2009 and 2011. Meanwhile, over the past year, the prices of soft commodities and metals have fallen by about 25pc and 10pc respectively.

You can see the effects on the inflation figures around the world. In the US, the latest headline inflation figure was 1.8pc, and the latest core figure was 1.6pc. It looks to me as though inflation will be down to about 1.3pc by the autumn. In the eurozone, it is a similar story. Inflation is currently running at 1.6pc but it looks as though it will be well below 1pc by the end of the year. And whereas two years ago, inflation in the emerging markets was on average running at over 6pc, it is now down to about 4pc.

The world has been particularly unfortunate to have had to endure the combination of the biggest financial crisis so far and a huge spike in commodity prices. The latter squeezed real incomes just as the former clobbered the banking system and depressed the economy. We may not have solved the former, although we are now on the way. It seems that we are also on the way to dealing with the latter.

The easing back in China’s growth rate is part of the story behind lower commodity prices. But it is not all of it. For the boom in commodity prices went too far. A considerable speculative element was involved. And, of course, the surge in energy prices came before the take-off of fracking in the US, which has since caused natural gas prices to fall by 60pc over the past five years. Here in the UK, if inflation starts to fall, then the benefits will be palpable. By about the middle of next year, average real earnings should be rising again. And by election time in May 2015, average earnings may be outpacing prices by about 1.5pc – although they would still be 6pc down from their peak in 2007.

It is striking that the change in global inflation prospects has delivered yet another blow to that supreme gauge of investors’ inchoate fear, namely gold. This is just about the worst possible combination for gold: stabilisation of the financial system, signs of gradual economic recovery, the prospect of higher interest rates and bond yields and a prospective end to Quantitative Easing (QE) – but still no inflationary surge !

A prospective fall in inflation is not an unalloyed blessing for other reasons, too. For with short-term interest rates not falling and bond yields rising on the fears of an early end to QE, the real rate of interest has been rising. Not only does that itself tend to retard the economic recovery, but it also puts further pressure on indebtedness. Mind you, if, in the best traditions of British Rail, the inflation surge that we have endured in the UK was the wrong sort of inflation, then for what we are about to receive we should be truly grateful. For this would be the right sort of disinflation, that is to say disinflation driven by lower commodity prices, which makes the country better off. In the jargon, it will represent an improvement in the UK’s terms of trade. This should not harm the growth of the tax base.

Indeed, if it leads to faster economic growth because consumers are better off, then it should boost tax receipts.

But any inflationary trends that start off benignly can develop into the opposite. If the eurozone, for instance, were to undergo a burst of low inflation brought on by weak commodity prices, that would be good at first. Yet if this led to low expectations of inflation, which then became the basis for lower inflation rates, then there would be trouble ahead. For the eurozone needs real interest rates and bond yields to be low, or ideally negative, in order to keep down the real cost of government funding and the real value of accumulated debt.

Japan has set about trying to get out of its debt problem partly by getting the inflation rate higher, having experienced for 20 years the problems of grumbling deflation. It would be ironic if the eurozone were to fall into the Japanese trap just as Japan itself was escaping from it.

Even if I am right and the next couple of years do see a return to much lower rates of inflation, allowing increases in real average earnings, this does not mean that the inflation danger has gone away – or even, as the title of one of my books of some 17 years ago might imply, that inflation is “dead”. As I have said all along, the real inflationary danger comes from the possibility that at some stage governments and central banks will actually choose a higher rate of inflation in order to try to escape from the debt burden.

While prospects of economic recovery are alive, and in some cases fiscal austerity seems to be bringing some reduction in deficits, if not in debt, then policymakers will surely push thoughts of the inflationary solution to the back of their mind – or even further. Yet if we do enjoy a period of lower inflation in the months ahead, don’t be fooled into thinking that this longer-term inflation danger will have been laid to rest. It will still be lurking beneath the surface, waiting to catch out the unwary. Some reason to hold gold, after all?

Roger Bootle is managing director of Capital Economics.Email him at roger.bootle@capitaleconomics.com